Yorkshire Festival of Story
Saturday 26 November
Written by Imogen Royston, aged 13
Joanne Harris is a writer who lives in Yorkshire. Today I went down to Settle Community Library to take part in a writing workshop with her, and I have to say, it was very good.
She began by making herself aware of everyone’s names, including the parents, then asked some questions about books and writing. Another thing she said was that writing is a career, and that no one should tell you otherwise. She also started the conversation “what is a story and where can you find them?”. This led to a lot of good statements from everyone, and Joanne gave examples of how she sees stories everywhere. One of them was about how on a visit to Dragon Hall in Norwich, and how she saw some unusual markings on a wall; when she looked into them, the markings were actually put there to fend off witches a long time ago. I found this very interesting, and it seemed to have everyone else hooked as well. If anyone answered any of her questions, she never said that they were wrong, but if they were not quite right, she gave reasons why they were not necessarily correct, so that the person understood.
We then had to think about the question “what does a story need?”. Lots of answers were provided, and Joanne added/explained them in greater depth, in an interesting way. Then, once we had an idea of the main aspects, Joanne told us that we would be making a story as a group. She asked one of us to think of a character, and another to elaborate on their personality. After that, we thought up a very original storyline, planning out all of the problem along the way. Everyone was prompted to provide their ideas. By the end, we had a full-on story, with lots of creativity and fun involved. Joanne kept referring to the “story bridge”, which I think helped us to make the story better. Joanne finished by telling us that we were all natural born story tellers, and congratulated us all.
All in all, it was an excellent workshop, and I would definitely recommend attending one if you can!
Written by Imogen Royston, aged 13, as part of the Young Reporters scheme in partnership with North Yorkshire County Council. Photographs by Tony Crossland.
